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The University of San Francisco
USF Scholarship: a digital repository @ Gleeson Library |
Geschke Center
Sociology College of Arts and Sciences
2011
The Unwatched Life Is Not worth Living: The
Elevation of the Ordinary in Celebrity Culture
Joshua Gamson
University of San Francisco, gamson@usfca.edu
Follow this and additional works at: http://repository.usfca.edu/soc
Part of the Sociology Commons, and the Television Commons
Recommended Citation
Gamson, J. (2011). The unwatched life is not worth living: The elevation of the ordinary in celebrity culture. PMLA, 126(4),
1061-1069. doi:10.1632/pmla.2011.126.4.1061
This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the College of Arts and Sciences at USF Scholarship: a digital repository @ Gleeson Library |
Geschke Center. It has been accepted for inclusion in Sociology by an authorized administrator of USF Scholarship: a digital repository @ Gleeson
Library | Geschke Center. For more information, please contact repository@usfca.edu.126.4 ]
theories and
methodologies
The Unwatched
Life Is Not Worth
Living: The Elevation
WHEN MY FIRST DAUGHTER WAS BORN A FEW YEARS AGO, I ENTERED A
CELEBRITY NEWS BLACKOUT, A SOMEWHAT DISCOMFITING CONDITION
of the Ordinary in
for a sociologist of celebrity. When she entered preschool, though, Celebrity Culture
I resubscribed to Us Weekly and devoured its morsels like a starv-
ing man at McDonald’s: Kim Kardashian and her then-boyfriend
ate at Chipotle on their irst date! Ashton Kutcher was mad about his joshua gamson
neighbor’s noisy construction! Lindsay Lohan is back in rehab! I felt
less disconnected from others, comforted by the familiar company,
a little dirtier and a little lighter.
I meandered through online celebrity culture, too, where things
were not quite as familiar, visiting mean Internet gossip sites like
Gawker and PerezHilton .com and listening to remixes of Christian
Bale’s foul-mouthed rant at a cameraman. I also watched an array
of YouTube celebrities, most of whom had been adopted by fans for
some quirk they’d exhibited intentionally or just by living their lives:
Tay Zonday, a tiny PhD candidate with a giant singing voice; the
jumbo Yosemite dweller whose awed response to a double rainbow
was viewed over twenty million times; and Antoine Dodson, whose
interview clip from a local news show (“hide your kids, hide your
wife, hide your husband, cause they raping everybody out here”) was
a YouTube sensation, leading to remixes on iTunes, a T-shirt line, a
ringtone, and Halloween costumes. Via Twitter, I could receive a bar-
rage of 140-character tidbits from celebrities, such as info about Tina
JOSHUA GAMSON, professor of sociol-
Fey’s lunch (Caramello bar), Demi Moore’s adoption rumor (false), ogy at the University of San Francisco,
and her daughter Rumer’s highway experience (“Two words: Traf- is the author of Claims to Fame: Celebrity
ic sucks”). If returning to celebrity culture was a bit like coming in Contemporary America (U of Califor-
home—I’d written a book on the subject, Claims to Fame, back in the nia P, 1994), Freaks Talk Back: Tabloid
1990s—that home also seemed to have been signiicantly remodeled. Talk Shows and Sexual Nonconformity
(U of Chicago P, 1998), and The Fabulous
his essay maps that perplexing architecture, considering how and
Sylvester: The Legend, the Music, the Sev-
with what signiicance twenty-irst-century American celebrity cul-
enties in San Francisco (Picador–H. Holt,
ture builds on and departs from earlier forms.1 In particular, I high- 2005). A recent Gug genheim fellow, he
light what is arguably the most prominent development in American is working on a book about unconven-
celebrity culture over the past two decades: the decisive turn toward the tional family creation.
[ © 2011 by the moder n language association of america ] 10611062 The Unwatched Life Is Not Worth Living [ PM L A
ordinary. As opposed to earlier periods, when pacity to attract and mobilize attention, which
theories and methodologies
American celebrities were a class of people per- is then typically attached to other products
ceived as extraordinary and treated to extraor- (a television show, a magazine cover, a rec
dinary lives—a “powerless elite,” as Francesco ord album) or sold for cash directly to people
Alberoni once called them—celebrity culture is making those other products. In its most con
increasingly populated by unexceptional people ventional form, celebrity in the United States
who have become famous and by stars who have emerges from, and is managed by, a tightly
been made ordinary. What are the roots and controlled, wellresourced industry, linked
contours of this cultural transformation? What institutions centered mostly in Los Angeles
are we to make of the triumph of the ordinary and New York. From those centers, oten in a
celebrity, of what Graeme Turner has called the conlictridden negotiation between publicists
“demotic turn” in celebrity culture (82)? and journalists (Gamson, Claims, chs. 3–5),
The tension between the extraordinary the stories of celebrity arise: not just about fa
and the ordinary in American celebrity cul- mous people but about fame as well, about the
ture—and, relatedly, between merit and man- machinery of publicity, about what is and isn’t
ufacture, authenticity and fakery—is not new admirable, about distinguishing the real from
(Gamson, Claims, chs. 1–2; Braudy). Yet the the fake, the private self from the publicly pre
emergence of reality TV and of the Internet, sented one. Consumers of celebrity culture
especially Web 2.0 phenomena, has pushed then do all sorts of things with these stories,
ordinariness into the cultural forefront. In oten giving them new meanings. Some make
what follows, I document the propulsion of use of celebrity stories to fantasize a diferent
ordinary folks into stardom, the focus on life, to construct their identities, or to model
the ordinary lives of famous people, and themselves on people they admire or envy;
the rise of new celebrity types. Although it others use them as fodder for connecting so
is tempting to interpret these developments cially with one another, by gossiping with im
as uniformly democratizing, I argue that punity about the behavior and relationships
they are met also with pullbacks toward the of these commonly held igures; still others
centralized celebrity industry and may even use the stories to have conversations in which
reinforce the rarity and value of the “extraor- they attempt to distinguish the real person
dinary” celebrity. In the end, the signiicance from the massproduced commodity (Gam
of the ordinary in celebrity culture is found son, Claims, chs. 6–8; Turner, pt. 3).
not so much in what it reveals about how Within this cultural system, which re
fame is diferently produced as in its harmony mains very much intact, ordinariness has a
with the increased expectation, and everyday long, complex, and vexed history. Some critics
experience, of being watched. have argued that celebrity by deinition dis
connects exceptionality from fame; in what
is perhaps the foundational text of “celebrity
Twentieth-Century Celebrity Culture:
studies,” Daniel Boorstin argues that celebri
Ordinariness as a Persistent Theme
ties are “human pseudoevents,” people who
he analytic categories with which celebrity are “wellknown for their wellknownness”
is best apprehended remain useful even in the (67), as opposed to heroes, who were famous
midst of change: celebrity culture is at once for doing great things. As Leo Braudy has am
a commodity system, an industry, a set of ply demonstrated, fame never simply resulted
stories, and a participatory culture. he com from heroic action; yet one need only look
modity at stake is embodied attention; the as far as Paris Hilton, or her foremother Zsa
value of the celebrity inheres in his or her ca Zsa Gabor, to see that the modern celebrity126.4 ] Joshua Gamson 1063
system has the wherewithal, incentives, and celebrity production was tightly controlled,
theories and methodologies
tendency to value visibility in and of itself. To it was possible to build and maintain images
do its work, the celebrity industry certainly of extraordinariness (deCordova). After its
doesn’t need its celebrities to be extraordinary. demise, beginning with antitrust actions in
What the celebrity industry does require of its the late 1940s, celebrity production became
humans is that they live, whether glamorously dispersed among a greater number of inter-
or not, for the camera. As Neal Gabler sug- ested parties and the control of images and
gests, what distinguishes celebrities—most stories more conlict-ridden. Celebrity pro-
of whom are actually known for something duction also became more visible, heighten-
they’ve done—is narrative: a celebrity stars ing the suspicion that celebrity status was
in his or her own “life movie” and provides artiicially produced and undeserved. Here
entertainment by “the very process of living” displays of ordinariness quickly took a cen-
(5). In this system, there has long been plenty tral place, ofering up the “real” self behind
of room for ordinariness to lourish. the “manufactured” celebrity image, with im-
Indeed, the story lines of American celeb- ages of famous people’s “everyday lives” as the
rity culture have been built on a set of tensions means to approximate that realness (Gamson,
in which ordinariness plays a crucial role. Claims, chs. 1–2).
American culture, at least as an ideological he most common narrative strategy—
environment, is oten hostile toward anything
“come see what they’re really like”—invites
resembling aristocracy, which conlicts with
identification with celebrities. The sugges-
egalitarian beliefs. he presence of a celebrity
tion that celebrities are ordinary folks ofers,
class has thus presented a bit of a problem.
in place of cynicism, the fantasy of intimacy
Contemporary celebrity has been composed
with the famous (Dyer; Schickel). Thus, for
of two major, often competing narratives
instance, one often encounters photos that
about the relation between celebrity status and
demonstrate simultaneously celebrities’ ex-
merit. In one, people become famous because
traordinary glamour and awesome beauty
of achievement, merit, talent, or special inter-
on the red carpet and their just-like-us, un-
nal qualities, earning admiration and atten-
tion; they are cream at the top of a meritocracy. glamorous trips to the grocery store or a res-
In the other, people become famous because taurant. Gossip columns and tabloids, also
they have been made so, artiicially produced widespread since the beginning of modern,
for mass consumption by a team of investors, twentieth-century celebrity culture and ex-
publicists, makeup artists, magazine publish- ploding in the 1970s, propose to puncture
ers, and the like; they are factory products. In the public image of celebrities with the oten
the irst, they are successful because they are sordid or ugly “truths” of their private lives,
extraordinary, unlike us, and more powerful their ordinary human foibles, their feet of
than we are; in the second, they are ordinary clay. he supermarket magazine racks declare
people, just like us, only luckier, prettier, and that, like everyone else, celebrities look plain
better marketed. In the irst, their elevated so- or blemished without makeup, lie about their
cial status is justiied; in the second, arbitrary. sexuality, get fat, betray lovers, go into wild
In the first, they are to be revered or vicari- rages; despite their publicists’ protestations,
ously consumed; in the second, to be disdained they are ordinary mortals. In these ways, as
or consumed as objects of identiication.2 celebrity has become suspect as fabricated
hese two stories have coexisted, some- and false, the ordinary life has been made to
times uncomfortably, for quite a while. In the stand in for the real and true. Admiration and
days of the Hollywood studio system, where resentment, honor and suspicion, egalitarian1064 The Unwatched Life Is Not Worth Living [ PM L A
and hierarchical impulses have thus been pre- modities owned by the production company,
theories and methodologies
cariously held together. these “dispensable celebrities” are cheap and
easily replaced (Collins 89). Ordinariness,
because of its beneits to producers, is an es-
Reality TV: The Celebration of the Ordinary
sential programming strategy.
In 1968 Andy Warhol quipped that “in the he making of celebrities out of ordinary
future, everyone will be world-famous for if- folks is not just one of reality TV’s chief con-
teen minutes.” When that line became tired, sequences but also one of its main story lines
he changed it to “In iteen minutes, every- (Holmes). Consider the main subgenres of re-
body will be famous” (Warhol and Colacello ality programming. On reality talent compe-
48). Hyperbole was Warhol’s trademark, but titions like A merican Idol, So You hink You
he wasn’t exactly wrong. If ordinariness has Can Dance, and America’s Next Top Model,
been a persistent part of American celebrity the central narrative is in some ways old-
discourse for at least a century—in part be- school: ostensibly, the shows are a means of
cause it connotes the democratic openness of inding deserving stars and watching as they
Warhol’s predictions—it seems to have over- earn the right to fame. At the same time, the
whelmed that discourse in the last twenty- shows’ interest comes from observing the
ive years. Several forces, most notably new process by which ordinary people become ce-
television programming strategies and new lebrities, how they are explicitly transformed,
Web technologies, have pushed the ordinary commodified, and marketed—what Tom
to the forefront. Mole calls “hypertrophic celebrity” culture, in
So-called reality TV developed in the late which fascination is directed at the mechanics
1980s in response to changing economic con- of celebrity production. On American Idol, for
ditions in Hollywood characterized, among example, contestants talk openly about how
other things, “by the rising costs of network they intend to position themselves within “the
program production, competition for adver- industry,” and their movement from obscu-
tising revenue among more distributors,” and rity to celebrity is dramatized, complete with
“greater debt incurred by the networks” (Col- screaming fans, makeovers, and, not inciden-
lins 96; see also Raphael). Reality program- tally, weekly roles in Ford ads.
ming had several advantages: it was quicker Other reality subgenres dramatize the
and cheaper to produce than scripted pro- ordinary becoming celebrated more obliquely
gramming, since it needed neither writers nor but just as powerfully. On reality games like
actors, and it bypassed union constraints and Survivor, he Apprentice, or he Bachelor, al-
agents’ fees, since it used nonunion “actors.” legedly real people are given unusual tasks,
As Turner describes it, reality TV producers and their manipulations and stamina are dra-
take control of the “economy of celebrity by matized; on reality “docusoaps” such as he
turning it into an outcome of a program- Real World, Teen Mom, or the various Real
ming strategy” (53). hey take “civilians,” of- Housewives franchises, previously unfamous
ten with no special abilities or achievements, people are followed around, their interac-
and, by ilming them, make celebrities “out tions, relationships, and especially conlicts
of nothing, bypassing what we might think of presented as melodramatic documentary
as the conventional conditions of entry (spe- (Collins 90). In each the story is not just the
cialized training, or a history of performance, game or the interpersonal dramas but also
for instance).” Given the vast and unending the “celebriication” (Rojek 186–87), visible
oversupply of ordinary people seeking visibil- in external coverage promoted by the shows’
ity and reality TV contestants’ status as com- producers, as well as within the shows’ dis-126.4 ] Joshua Gamson 1065
cursive environment. (Indeed, many of the dom, not its antithesis; the means of getting
theories and methodologies
“real housewives” have been shown market- attention, not something that must be hidden.
ing themselves over the course of a season,
launching books, music careers, or skin-care
Internet Celebrity: Anticelebrities,
lines on the basis of their newfound noto-
Do-It-Yourselfers, and Microcelebrities
riety.) In Nick Couldry’s terms, reality TV
works by persistently, even ritualistically, he Internet, especially Web 2.0 phenomena
telling the story of how ordinary people move such as YouTube, Myspace, and Facebook—
from the periphery to the cultural center, be- collaborative, participatory sites “where users
coming “media people” (85). are increasingly involved in creating web con-
Another subgenre, dubbed “celebreality” tent as well as consuming it” (Beer and Bur-
by VH1, one of its main purveyors, makes or- rows)—has rapidly changed the dynamics of
dinariness central in a diferent manner: re- celebrity culture. In many ways, the Internet
viving fading fame through the display of the has simply extended the reach of the exist-
ordinary lives of (mostly has-been) celebrities, ing entertainment industry, which uses it as
on shows like Celebrity Fit Club, Dancing with another marketing outlet, and expanded the
the Stars, and Celebrity Survivor or programs business of gossip, since “rumors of bad be-
built around igures like Scott Baio, Danny havior among celebrities likely travel faster
Bonaduce, Bobby Brown, and Tori Spelling. online than any other kind of hearsay” (Gra-
Filming ordinary lives (including moments zian 203; see also Burns). But beyond the uses
of celebrity latulence and bowel movements, of new Web technologies for more of the fa-
discussion of sexual positions, and unusual miliar celebrity marketing and gossip, the
uses of Preparation H) is here the means of Web has also generated a sort of bottom-up,
celebrity rehabilitation. To regain their fame, do-it-yourself celebrity production process
these celebrities purportedly show that they that is partly autonomous from its predeces-
are real people, free of the artiice of the star sors (Turner 54), since the “digital tools of
system they are working so hard to reenter. self-publicity are increasingly available to or-
To a degree, then, reality TV—inancially dinary people” (Bennett and Holmes 76). In
driven, industrially produced, centrally con- the established Hollywood-based celebrity
trolled—has transformed celebrity culture system, one has to navigate the tight gate-
by opening up unprecedented space for or- keeping structure, already tipped toward the
dinary people to become celebrities. Perhaps young, beautiful, or talented; ind, create, or
more signiicant, it has accentuated the story wait for a break; get an agent, a job, a record-
of how a nobody becomes a somebody, push- ing contract, and perhaps a publicist. he In-
ing forward the rhetorical fantasy of democ- ternet drastically widens the pool of potential
ratized celebrity. Shows like America’s Got celebrities by lowering the entry barriers—a
Talent present celebrity as an elected status, computer and a bit of moxie, and you’ve got
in which “America” (as the audience is con- a shot—and bypassing the tightly controlled
stantly addressed) votes on which ordinary publicity system and the tightly controlling
person is most deserving of stardom. On middle people of Hollywood. In this arena,
shows like he Real World, celebrity appears the fans are extremely active in the creation
as an equal- opportunity status that could of celebrity: “viral” celebrity grows primarily
land on anyone; on Celebrity Rehab, celeb- through links forwarded from one person to
rity ofers no protection from the quotidian another, reaction videos and blog postings,
struggles of body and psyche. For reality TV, tagging, and so on (Sorgatz). hus, many of
ordinariness becomes a credential for star- the stories being generated, about celebrities1066 The Unwatched Life Is Not Worth Living [ PM L A
and celebrity, are written outside the Holly- Crocker’s video blog about Britney Spears
theories and methodologies
wood star system. (“Leave Britney alone!” he rants tearfully) has
Often this different celebrity environ- been viewed more than 36 million times, re-
ment means simply that the Internet is a ceived over 550,000 comments, and generated
launching pad for performers who manage to extensive media coverage and numerous par-
build an audience online that they then use to odies. Countless other examples emerge daily:
break into the of-line entertainment world— the sexy philologist, the guy who started the
the teen megastar Justin Bieber comes to “free hugs” movement, performers of unusual
mind here—becoming like more convention- dances and weird lipsyncs, histrionic super-
ally derived celebrities. Yet the Internet has fans, dancing babies. Until being pushed aside
also given rise to a distinctive celebrity cul- by Bieber and Lady Gaga, YouTube’s most-
ture, in which the audience celebrates its own viewed video was Charlie Bit My Finger, a
star-making power: online celebrity is driven family video of a young boy sticking his inger
by the energy of “Hey, you guys, let’s make in his brother’s mouth, which made both boys
somebody famous!” “unlikely international stars” (Moore).
he kinds of celebrities generated on the A second dominant character in Inter-
Internet tend to be quite diferent from the old net celebrity is the self-made, do-it-yourself
image of the Hollywood star, yet in ways that celebrity, who has pursued fame outside,
once again promote the ordinary over the ex- despite, and sometimes in opposition to the
ceptional. One dominant type of Internet ce- established celebrity system. hese stars tend
lebrity is the anticelebrity, a collective in-joke, to ofer claims of extraordinariness, but their
in which the most unlikely candidate becomes stories routinely assert that in the digital
the most celebrated, circulated star. hese ce- age anyone can game the system, create and
lebrities tend to be ordinary people—exhibit- brand an identity, and become a star. Tila
ing no special talents or admirable qualities, Tequila, who went from Myspace popularity
ofering no claims to greatness, and operat- to reality TV stardom, is a prime example.
ing out of their living rooms—aside from a She looks like a pinup, and indeed that is
quirk that marks them as amateurs or outsid- one of her many identities, but she got there
ers. For instance, one of the earliest Web ce- by doing an end run around the Hollywood
lebrities was a thirty-seven-year-old Turkish gatekeeping system. She is the queen of self-
accordionist-journalist named Mahir Cagri, branding, having successfully created and
whose Web page became a sensation in 1999 marketed herself without industry support
(Gamson, “Web”). he site featured photos of (Trebay).3 Similarly, Jefree Star, an androg-
the mustachioed Cagri in a teeny bathing suit, ynous, openly gay former club kid, makeup
playing Ping-Pong, and with his accordion. artist, model, and performer, became one of
It ofered a welcome of “I Kiss You!!!!!” and the biggest stars of Myspace, blogging and
frank proclamations such as “I like sex,” some declaiming online and generating thousands
of which were apparently added by a Turk- of comments on each new posted photo; he
ish hacker. Within months of his posting, his is now a successful club music artist, among
page views in the millions, Cagri was brought other things (Immediato). Star describes
on a stateside tour, appeared on major talk himself as “half super bitch and half mega
shows, was proiled in Time, and was listed as cunt,” “brazenly sexual and openly subver-
one of Forbes’s one hundred most inluential sive,” and the “consummate fame-sucking
people in the entertainment industry. Since whore.” He also notes his cultural signifi-
then, this logic of the anticelebrity has driven cance: “He carries the torch as a self made
much of Internet celebrity. For instance, Chris celebrity,” Star says, referring to himself in126.4 ] Joshua Gamson 1067
the celebrity third person. “Some celebrities though the seeds were planted long ago, Web-
theories and methodologies
are manufactured by the system. Others beat and reality-based culture have helped bring
the system and manufacture themselves.” For to fruition a significant trend in American
sale on his merchandise Web site are T-shirts celebrity: a rapid increase in the spectacle of
that say, “Fuck me, I’m a celebrity.” ordinary people becoming celebrities and of
A final variety of Internet celebrity, a celebrities being shown as entirely ordinary
close relative of the self-made star, is the mi- and a resurgence of the rhetorical claim that
crocelebrity, famous to a small community of celebrity is available to anyone, no matter
fans who participate directly in producing the how unexceptional—in short, the lionization
celebrity (Sent 25; Marwick and boyd). Some of the ordinary.
of what makes this fame micro is its scope; a
new cliché suggests that soon we will all be fa-
Conclusion: Democratized Fame and
mous to iteen people (Momus). Another fac-
Self-Surveillance
tor is the way the fame is generated: through
the interactive dissemination of information On the one hand, one can see in these de-
about one’s everyday life (Chaudhry; homp- velopments a further democratization of ce-
son). his type of celebrity is made possible lebrity. Access to celebrity appears to have
by online publishing and social-networking opened up radically, as ordinary people are
sites: anyone can blog about his or her every- pursued for entertainment and as publicity
day life to a potentially large audience, design technologies not in control of Hollywood
a public proile with words and images, and gatekeepers have become relatively easy and
instantaneously send “clever observations inexpensive to access. Celebrity cultivation
and ripostes targeted at dozens of adoring has been at least partially decentralized, so
fans/friends,” as one journalist and micro- that it is in the hands of many rather than a
celebrity put it (Sorgatz). Self-publicity has few. hrough the Internet in particular, the
become technologically easy, and the revela- power of audiences to create celebrity, not
tion of the ordinary self in everyday activity simply consume it, appears to have dramati-
becomes a mechanism of attention getting— cally increased (Jenkins). Alternative visions
nothing else is needed. As one such star, the of celebrity are thriving, many of them more
New York City self-promoter Julia Allison, egalitarian than their predecessors. Some are
put it, “In the past, I would have had to go anti-industrial; some evade the commodiica-
through a reporter or a PR rep. Now we are tion of celebrity; others celebrate the empow-
all our own publicists. And we all have to ered self-commodiier; still others assert that
learn the tricks” (qtd. in Tanz). Allison is now ordinary lives can be, at least for a bit, worthy
a “media personality,” a “professional talking of attention.
head” who has “made over 350 on-air appear- On the other hand, it is easy to overes-
ances in the past year alone” (“Bio”). timate these changes. Even if much celebrity
Internet celebrity culture has, then, made creation now takes place outside the entertain-
it easy for ordinary people to build an audi- ment centers of Los Angeles and New York,
ence, bypassing the traditional celebrity in- the control center of celebrity culture has
dustry; elevated the role of fans or audiences, hardly shited. he interests of those with the
turning them into powerful producers of capital to give celebrity its value remain pri-
celebrities, hyperaware of their star-making mary. Web celebrity, for instance, still has no-
capacity; and moved to the forefront new ce- where near the social and commercial value of
lebrity characters and narratives that seem a good old-fashioned television appearance or
to defy the traditional celebrity system. Al- studio contract. Internet users may be lexing1068 The Unwatched Life Is Not Worth Living [ PM L A
their muscles at the moment of discovery, but Andrejevic has called “the work of being
theories and methodologies
cyberstars tend to try to convert their online watched,” induced by heightened surveil-
celebrity into conventional Hollywood-ish lance. Expecting, as Couldry describes it,
currency. Moreover, the established enter- “any everyday activity legitimately to be put
tainment industry has been quick to absorb under surveillance and monitored for a huge
celebrities whose fame is generated outside its unknown audience” (91), we are “auto-spies”
quarters. In fact, the Internet takes much of who see ourselves through the constant “gaze
the guesswork out of discovery, reducing risks of the other” (Andrejevic, “Visceral Literacy”
and costs for major entertainment companies, 339). On Facebook and elsewhere, we design
since aspirants do the initial development and self-flattering profiles, post status updates,
marketing. At the discursive level, too, the ex- upload photos of ourselves and get tagged
isting celebrity system is adept at absorbing in others’ uploads, labor to choose the right
these changes. he emergence of a vast layer “25 random things about me,” which are, of
of semiknown people whose celebrity has a course, not random at all. Video cameras
“rapid rate of decay” can be mobilized to re- are marketed with a one-touch-upload-to-
inforce the value and distinction of those at YouTube function. It is not so much that ev-
the top of the celebrity hierarchy (Kurzman, eryone gets fifteen minutes of fame or that
Anderson, Key, Lee, Moloney, Silver, and Van anyone can be a star but that everyone al-
Ryn 354). It is probably not coincidental that ready is a star: we ordinary people are grow-
the elevation of ordinary celebrity has coin- ing accustomed to not just watching but also
cided with the popularizing of the notion of being constantly watched.
A-list and D-list celebrities (interestingly, one
rarely hears mention of the B and C grades).
The crowd of ordinaries—D-listers, wan-
nabes, microcelebrities, YouTube and reality
stars—oten take their place as evidence that NOTES
merited celebrity is rare, extraordinary, and 1. Although fame has a cultural history reaching back
justiiably more heavily rewarded (Palmer). many centuries (Braudy), the celebrity culture to which
I refer is by deinition contemporary, a phenomenon de-
There are pulls and counterpulls at pendent on media industries capable of producing and
work, toward and away from a more egalitar- disseminating images on a mass scale.
ian, popularly controlled celebrity system. 2. In a similar vein, Chris Rojek distinguishes be-
Rather than being evidence of a democra- tween “achieved celebrity,” which recognizes rare skills
or talents (16), and “attributed celebrity,” which arises
tized celebrity system, perhaps the ascent of
from the work of “cultural intermediaries” (18).
the ordinary is significant for the everyday 3. Lisa Nakamura notes the racial meanings carried
understandings of publicness that it both en- by Tequila’s “‘user generated’ as well as self-made” con-
courages and crystallizes. he ordinary turn struction of her own celebrity, which is “racialized as dia-
in celebrity culture is ultimately part of a sporic and polysexual” (1680).
heightened consciousness of everyday life as
a public performance—an increased expec-
tation that we are being watched, a growing WORKS CITED
willingness to ofer up private parts of the self Alberoni, Francesco. “he Powerless ‘Elite’: heory and
to watchers known and unknown, and a hov- Sociological Research on the Phenomenon of the
ering sense that perhaps the unwatched life is Stars.” Sociology of Mass Communications: Selected
Readings. Ed. Denis McQuail. Harmondsworth: Pen-
invalid or insuicient. guin, 1972. 75–98. Print.
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